DOMESTIC workers may be forced to administer medication to people with mental health problems after 5pm and at weekends as the staffing crisis within the mental health services escalates.

THE HSE made just €6 million from the sale of mental health properties between 2005 and 2011, documents obtained by the Irish Examiner have revealed.

THE true extent of the staffing crisis in community mental health services has been revealed as figures show just 21 of 124 adult community mental health teams (CMHTs) and one of 53 child and adolescent teams are fully staffed.

THERE were 2,517 young people on a waiting list to access mental health services at the end of the first quarter of this year — 346 of whom have been waiting for more than a year, official figures have shown.

IT’S a sign of the times to see new houses lying idle but to see this particular property – fully furnished and with facilities – but with no inhabitants is particularly sad.

SOME of the facilities we offer to people with mental health issues seem as likely to exacerbate illness as to contribute to recovery.

ABOUT 300 people with intellectual disabilities are still languishing in psychiatric hospitals despite Government commitments to move them into community care.

IT is “misleading” to say there are 55 child and adolescent mental health teams operating around the country, according to a leading child psychiatrist.

YESTERDAY a Nigerian, who has been charged with trying to sleep naked in a crib in the Redemptorist Church in Limerick on December 29, was remanded to prison following an assault in a hotel where he was accommodated by the State.

IRELAND is a Third World country in terms of its psychiatric services, a leading psychiatrist has claimed.